The Morning Heresy 4/24/12: The Fruity Pair

April 24, 2012

Oh no. Mr. Texas Creationism Textbooks himself, Don McLeroy, was on Colbert. It's kind of sublime how Colbert deals with McLeroy as a compatriot, totally straight-faced. I almost wonder if it was the one thing that might have made McLeroy think, "Wow. What I'm saying really is kind of nutty."

Michael De Dorareminds me that, heck, you and I do matter to our filthy, corrupt, amoral political representatives

In an earlier age, skepticism was not so much a movement as a pastime for older, male, upper-crust academics. It was spirited discussion over cigars and brandy. Today, the new skepticism is a grassroots revolution. Its adherents are media-savvy, and they use memes, humor, Photoshop, YouTube, and social networking to wage a bold offensive against the prevailing belief culture.

Surely Governor Romney meant to persuade Religious Right and tea-party activists that he's ready to do battle -- not just to entrench the corporate Court that rules today, but to nominate people to the bench who will turn back the clock on civil rights and liberties.

Katherine Stewart in the Guardian on the problem of school vouchers for parochial schools:

You don't have to be a constitutional scholar to get that using public money to fund religious schools violates the letter and spirit of the first amendment. Even the radical conservatives in today's Federalist Society would agree that the US constitution would not allow the government to cut a check to, say, the local mosque in exchange for supplying education to local schoolchildren.

CFI-Michigan is putting on a big debate at Grand Valley State University on Thursday: Jacoby vs. D'Souza!

AlterNet on how the Supreme Court has pandered to Christianity over the years

Cranston School Committee agrees to pay half of the legal bills in the Ahlquist case

University of Missouri study: There's no "God spot" on the brain, but folks can become more religious when their right hemisphere's functionality is "minimized"

No government can accommodate every conceivable religious practice or belief, nor does the Catholic Church have a strong record of supporting accommodation of other religious communities. In their simplistic rhetoric, the bishops sound more like politicians than pastors.

And the nuns who are on the receiving end of a bishop-led crackdown are not having it

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Paul Fidalgo has been communications director of the Center for Inquiry since 2012. He holds a master’s degree in political management from George Washington University, and has worked previously for FairVote: The Center for Voting and Democracy and the Secular Coalition for America. Paul is also an actor and musician whose work includes five years performing with the American Shakespeare Center. He lives in Maine with his wife and kids. His blog is Near-Earth Object, and he tweets at @paulfidalgo.